The Sphinx's Riddle

The lightning cracked across the Detroit skyline, illuminating the baseball stadium where Elias sat alone in section 42. His fedora—purchased at a thrift store in 1987—had become as much a part of him as the regret that lived in his marrow.

Forty years as a corporate spy, and what did he have to show for it? A faded photograph of a daughter who didn't speak to him. A bank account full of blood money. And tonight, a baseball game he'd watched alone for fifteen consecutive seasons, always section 42, always row F, always seat 12.

"You look like a man who's forgotten the question," a woman said, dropping into the seat beside him.

Elias stiffened. She wasn't supposed to be here. Nobody ever sat in section 42, row F, seat 12. That was the point.

"Marlena." His voice caught. "They told me you died in Prague."

"They tell you lots of things." She placed a sphinx paperweight on the seat between them—a duplicate of the one they'd stolen together from a museum director's collection in 1998. "Remember what we said about riddles?"

"Riddles without answers are just questions that hurt."

"The answer was always each other, Elias." She touched his hat brim. "We had one mission left. The company's keeping something in their Cairo facility. Something that matters."

The scoreboard changed. 2-2, bottom of the ninth. Lightning struck again, closer this time.

"I'm done, Marlena. I'm sixty-three years old. I want to watch baseball games in peace."

"You think you're the spy?" She laughed, bitter and knowing. "You've been the asset since 1989. They've been playing you, Elias. Playing both of us. Cairo is where they keep the files on everyone they've ever used. Everyone they've discarded."

A player hit a home run. The crowd roared.

"One last mission," she whispered. "For us. Not them. For the truth."

Elias removed his hat, set it on the sphinx. The riddle had finally found its answer. "Let's go to Cairo."